Beyond a Can Drive: Commitments and Collaborative Efforts for Addressing Students' Food Insecurity Kirsten Levine, Lynn Nester, Jesse Felix California State University, San Bernardino Abstract Addressing students’ food insecurity is a complicated problem, both in securing healthy food resources and reducing the stigma around being food insecure. A partnership between ASI, the Department of Housing and Residential Education, and Recreation and Wellness created an innovative campus garden to help remedy student food insecurity. The community garden teaches students how to use inexpensive resources to grow and harvest healthy vegetables, and The Obershaw DEN pantry provides a distribution site, vegetable peelers and easy recipes with garden ingredients. The commitment of campus and community partnerships has driven the success of the garden from student, staff and faculty involvement to maintain the garden, grant writing and securing of donations of time and materials from the CSUSB Greenhouse, the City of San Bernardino Municipal Water Department, the Inland Empire Resource Conservation District, and the American Heart Association’s Teaching Garden program. The goals are to demonstrate that gardening can combat the stigma associated with food insecurity, that garden grown vegetables are both nutritious and delicious, and the valuable life skills that can be learned through growing your own food. Educational programming surrounding the garden has provided opportunities for students to learn how to make a healthy and sustainable impact on their college experience. The contributions of harvested produce from the community garden have added great value to existing efforts to provide low to no cost food to students including the emergency food pack program, hot meal cards and the ability to purchase food from campus dining at a reduced cost. Purpose Statement Collaborators identified the need for students to have increased access to food on the California State University, San Bernardino main campus, to combat food insecurity. This commitment to student led to the implementation of the Community Garden, Den Pack Distribution, Food at Cost, and Hot Meal Cards to address student needs. References Bradham, B., Moorthy, N., Beyer, A., & Kerman, S. (2015). Food insecurity on college campuses. Retrieved from http://www.dukechronicle.com/article/2015/04/food-insecurity-college-campuses Cady, C. L. (2014). Food insecurity as a student issue. Journal of College and Character, 15(4), 265-272. Crutchfield, R., & Maguire, J. (2018). Study of Basic Needs. California State University Basic Needs Initiative, 26. (Crutchfield & Maguire, 2018) • 49.1 Million Americans are food insecure (Bradham, Moorthy, Beyer, & Kerman, 2015). • 31% of students report needing to choose between food and tuition (Bradham et al., 2015). • 4.65 Million students rely on food pantries (Bradham et al., 2015). • Food insecurity can affect academic performance, student behavior and engagement and thereby affecting retention and graduation rates (Cady, 2014). • 14% of colleges students experienced some form of food insecurity (Cady,2014). • Food insecurity is more likely to adversely affect populations that that are already underserved (Cady,2014). The Issue
Transcript
Beyond a Can Drive: Commitments and Collaborative Efforts for Addressing Students' Food InsecurityKirsten Levine, Lynn Nester, Jesse Felix
California State University, San Bernardino
AbstractAddressing students’ food insecurity is a complicated problem, both in securing healthy food resources and reducing the stigma around being food insecure. A partnership between ASI, the Department ofHousing and Residential Education, and Recreation and Wellness created an innovative campus garden to help remedy student food insecurity. The community garden teaches students how to useinexpensive resources to grow and harvest healthy vegetables, and The Obershaw DEN pantry provides a distribution site, vegetable peelers and easy recipes with garden ingredients. The commitment ofcampus and community partnerships has driven the success of the garden from student, staff and faculty involvement to maintain the garden, grant writing and securing of donations of time and materialsfrom the CSUSB Greenhouse, the City of San Bernardino Municipal Water Department, the Inland Empire Resource Conservation District, and the American Heart Association’s Teaching Gardenprogram. The goals are to demonstrate that gardening can combat the stigma associated with food insecurity, that garden grown vegetables are both nutritious and delicious, and the valuable life skillsthat can be learned through growing your own food. Educational programming surrounding the garden has provided opportunities for students to learn how to make a healthy and sustainable impact ontheir college experience. The contributions of harvested produce from the community garden have added great value to existing efforts to provide low to no cost food to students including the emergencyfood pack program, hot meal cards and the ability to purchase food from campus dining at a reduced cost.
Purpose Statement Collaborators identified the need for students to have increasedaccess to food on the California State University, San Bernardinomain campus, to combat food insecurity. This commitment tostudent led to the implementation of the Community Garden, DenPack Distribution, Food at Cost, and Hot Meal Cards to addressstudent needs.
References Bradham, B., Moorthy, N., Beyer, A., & Kerman, S. (2015). Food insecurity on college campuses. Retrieved from http://www.dukechronicle.com/article/2015/04/food-insecurity-college-campuses
Cady, C. L. (2014). Food insecurity as a student issue. Journal of College and Character, 15(4), 265-272.
Crutchfield, R., & Maguire, J. (2018). Study of Basic Needs. California State University Basic Needs Initiative, 26.
(Crutchfield & Maguire, 2018)
• 49.1 Million Americans are food insecure (Bradham,Moorthy, Beyer, & Kerman, 2015).
• 31% of students report needing to choose between foodand tuition (Bradham et al., 2015).
• 4.65 Million students rely on food pantries (Bradham etal., 2015).
• Food insecurity can affect academic performance,student behavior and engagement and thereby affectingretention and graduation rates (Cady, 2014).
• 14% of colleges students experienced some form of foodinsecurity (Cady,2014).
• Food insecurity is more likely to adversely affectpopulations that that are already underserved(Cady,2014).
Beyond a Can Drive: Commitments and Collaborative Efforts for Addressing Students' Food Insecurity
Meal VouchersInspiration: The Community Garden is a student driven initiative prompted by theAssociated Students Incorporated of CSUSB. ASI was motivated to secure healthierfood options for student on campus, and to provide sustainability education tostudents.
The goal of the community garden was to provide students with a hands-onexperience to learn about sustainability and have a lasting impact on students’knowledge and desire for a sustainable community, meeting goals of the CSUSBStrategic Plan 2015-2020.
Process: In 2016, ASI and the Department of Housing and Residential Education staffand Green House Living Learning Community student leader collaborated to submit agrant proposal for the Cal State Student Association Greenovation fund. CSUSB wasawarded $2,000 to cover start-up costs.
The campus community assisted preparing the garden location in Housing, andpreparing 5 raised-beds for the community garden. Vegetable and herb plants, donatedby Bonnie Plants through the Teaching Garden Program with the American HeartAssociation, were planted on the Community Garden Grand Opening on October 10,2017.
Additional partnerships were made with the CSUSB Greenhouse, the City of SanBernardino Municipal Water Department, and the Inland Empire ResourceConservation District for donations of materials and time spent to teach students aboutthe garden.
Outcome: Students and the campus community have successfully maintained thecommunity garden, completed harvests for donations to volunteers and the ObershawDEN pantry, transplanted new crops and sowed seeds. The garden has yieldeddonations 80+ pounds of produce from Fall 2017 to Spring 2018.
Impact: The garden has created many opportunities for collaboration across campusand the Inland Empire that has shown students the positive impact they have made forthe campus, future students, and current students to combat food insecurity.
Community Garden Den PacksInspiration: Congruent with the research and data collected by the CSU Basic Needs Initiative statewide, 36.6% of CSUSB students reported food insecurity. Of those students 18.7% experienced low food security and 17.9% very low food security. The need for Day Packs was identified in order to assist student with short-term food insecurity while on campus. Obershaw Day Pack offer quick food options that do not require a preparation for student in need to get a meal while on campus. Students in need of a Day Pack often display levels of distress due to hunger, which impact their academic success.
Process: The Office of Community Engagement was able to work with multiplecampus partners to establish locations including centers in the SMSU and Housingwhere a student in need could receive a day pack. This always students to gaineasier access to this resources without having to wait for the Obershaw Den’shours of operations. All distributed packs are recorded and reported to the DEN tofollow-up with these students for long-term assistance. The DEN is relayed studentinformation to follow-up for long-term assistance.
Outcome: The DEN Packs eased students’ financial stress and have created easyaccess when unable to go to the DEN directly during the limited hours. 200+ packshave been distributed each month at 12 campus locations.
Impact: CSUSB is able to assist students to meet nutritional food intake, relievingthe stress of food insecurity and impacting their academic success. The DEN Packsprovide students with additional options for food access after campus diningoptions have closed.
Den PacksObershaw Day PacksOverview: The Office of Community Engagement [OCE], Department ofHousing and Residential Education [DHRE] and ASI met during the summer of2017 and identified the distribution of meal cards as an alternative to the Denpack. The DHRE Executive Director met with the UEC Director and negotiatedterms. UEC, DHRE and ASI contributed $1,000 each to the purchasing of MealVouchers.
Inspiration: The ASI Board of Directors committed to ensuring that students thatexperienced food insecurity had access to healthy food options.
Process: There are two ways that students can obtain a meal voucher. Individualsthat face food insecurity frequent the Den to pick up food. The Den staff get toknow a lot about these individuals through their interactions. The knowledge ofthese individuals hardships are used to determine who should receive a MealVoucher.
Outcome: Meal Vouchers are currently distributed through the CARE team, OCE,and DHRE to students that face food insecurity. As of Week 6, Spring 2018 37Vouchers have been distributed for all you care to eat dinner service. In Spring2018, availability of the Vouchers were increased with Health Center and CAPSdistribution.
Impact: The Meal Vouchers program has been useful in assisting our studentswith the most need. We will be looking at how individuals receive this benefit aredetermined to increase utilization.
Overview: ASI has historically purchased food for the Den at a rate of $1,000per quarter from Restaurant Depot.
Inspiration: An ASI Director from California State University, Los Angelesreported on how they were able to purchase food from their food provider at costfor their food pantry. The CSUSB ASI leadership team met with the Sodexoleadership team. Sodexo pledged to match the amount of food that ASI purchasedfrom their distributer. ASI can purchase food at 70% of market value and Sodexomatches dollar for dollar what is spent.
Process: A member from the Office of Community Engagement meets with oneof Sodexo’s chefs and places an order for food items that meet the needs of theDen. Sodexo invoices the half of the cost.
Outcome: The Den was able to fill its food panty and feed CSUSB students thatface food insecurity.
